Devious Vow: Chapter 28

“Have you lost your goddamn mind?!”

Two days after I move Eloise into the hotel, I look up from my desk when Gabriel storms into my office. From the look on his face, it’s obvious the secret’s already out.

“How’d you get Taylor to spill?”

He glares at me, shaking his head. “She didn’t. She didn’t have to, Alistair,” he grunts. “I’m a good fucking lawyer. I can smell bullshit when it stinks.”

“You’re welcome to use the shower in my private bath⁠—”

“It’s reckless,” he growls quietly, stomping over and dropping into one of the chairs across the desk from me.

“I know what I’m doing,” I mutter back.

“Do you?”

“She couldn’t stay with him, Gabriel,” I hiss. “The man’s a psychopath.”

“I’m not denying that,” my brother sighs tiredly. “But exactly what the fuck do you think the outcome is of you shacking up with Massimo’s wife?”

“She’s at a hotel, Gabriel, not in my bed.”

“Yeah? And which bed have you been in the last few nights?”

Touché.

“There’s been zero indication from fuckstick that he suspects anything. Their marriage is a sham. He doesn’t have any interest in her, doesn’t even touch her. He married her in exchange for the smuggling operation he got from her father. That’s. It. You can relax.”

“Can I?” Gabriel mutters. “What happens after Eloise returns from her business trip,” he air-quotes. “Is she going to be our perpetually on-the-road lawyer?”

I shrug. “That’s not a bad idea.”

“It’s a terrible idea!” he spits. “Reality is going to catch up to you, Alistair.”

“Gabriel, I’m an orphan with a murky background who went on to graduate law school and found one of the most prestigious firms in New York before the age of thirty-four.” I smile wryly. “I stopped believing in reality a long time ago.”

He smirks. “Okay, fair. I’m just…”

“Worried about me?” I grin. “I know. Thanks.”

“I mean, somebody has to be.” Gabriel exhales and glances at his watch. “Okay, I have to run and go over my notes.”

I nod grimly. As much as I hate to admit it, Charles was correct. Judge Hawkins’ schedule did have an unexpected opening this week, and she agreed to move our court time up. So tomorrow is the day we’ll be dropping our iron-clad alibi and blowing this case out of the water before it even sets sail.

“You’ve got this, brother.”

Gabriel stands, buttoning his jacket. “I know.”

I snicker. “Asshole.”

There’s a knock on my office door, and we glance up as Katerina walks in.

“Mr. Black?” She nods at me. “I just had a call from Mr. Carveli’s assistant.”

My eyes snap to my brother, whose jaw is clenched.

“What the hell did they want?” I mutter, dragging my gaze back to Kat. When I do, my gaze slips down to her hand at her side, holding a set of keys on a pink lanyard.

It’s her spare set that includes the key to my office and one to my locked file cabinet of VIP case files, and I’ve seen it on her person or desk about a million times. But for some reason, seeing it here in my office is making something ping in the back of my head, like a memory I can’t quite access, hidden behind a fog.

I frown at the lanyard, trying to cut through the haze in my mind.

“Uh…Mr. Black?”

I blink as I refocus on her. “Yeah.”

“I was saying, Mr. Carveli would like to have dinner with you. Tomorrow night at eight, at Keens Steakhouse.”

“Do we know what this is about?” Gabriel asks.

Katerina shakes her head. “His assistant said Mr. Carveli just wanted to catch up.” She raises an eyebrow at me. “Is that a no, or shall I call back and confirm?”

“Can I talk to you in private for a minute?” Gabriel grunts at me.

“In a second.” I glance back to Katerina. “Go ahead and confirm. Thanks, Katerina.”

When she’s gone, Gabriel fixes me with a despairing look.

“What? I’ll be fine.”

“You’re shacked up with the man’s wife, Alistair,” he growls. “Exactly how is this going to be fine?”

“He doesn’t know,” I shoot back.

“And if he does?”

“Don’t you have to go study?”

“I do, but I’d like to clarify that my brother isn’t going to do something stupid and get himself killed at dinner.”

“It’s Keens Steakhouse, not a warehouse out in Bushwick,” I say flatly. “Massimo’s psycho, but I don’t think he’s quite psycho enough to stab me over a porterhouse and a glass of fucking Chianti.”

“You willing to bet your life on that?”

“I’m willing to bet a meal at Keens on that.”

He sighs. “Just…be careful.”

“You know me.”

“Precisely what worries me,” he sighs. Then he frowns. “You sure you’re good?”

“I’m great.”

Except, I’m not.

Not really.

It’s not that I feel bad at all for killing Rocco. But it is…weighing on me. Sending people that I’ve beaten pretty badly to hospital is one thing. Taking a life with my bare hands is apparently not something I’m mentally prepared for, even though I know in my blood I’d do it again, if the scenario were to repeat itself.

Normally, my siblings are good sounding boards when something’s bothering me. Or Taylor. But there’s no way in hell I’m burdening them with this shit. With Tempest, it’s that I don’t want to see the look in her eye when she realizes I’m a killer. Gabriel could take something like that. I think Taylor could, too. But I’m not putting the burden of criminal liability that comes with knowing about my crime on any of them.

So for now, it’s just inside me.

Gnawing at me.

Putting me on edge.

That’s the state I’m in when Katerina gently reminds me that my one o’clock has arrived. I don’t even glance at my schedule to see who it is. I just float down there in a daze.

Which is why it hits me so abruptly when I open the door to Conference Room B and find Ansel fucking Albrecht sitting at the table, smiling at me.

“Alistair!” he says cheerily, standing and sticking out a hand. “Thanks for sitting down with me!”

I ignore his outstretched hand and take a seat across from him.

“What is this?” I growl quietly. “Taylor and her team are your liaisons with the firm.”

Ansel clears his throat, withdrawing his unshaken hand. He stays standing, though, and I really, really don’t like the way he’s looking down on me with this smug expression.

“I thought you and I should meet to…” He shrugs. “You know, clear the air.”

“My air is perfectly clear,” I growl.

Ansel smiles patronizingly. “Alistair, please. I know you’re not my biggest fan.”

“I don’t follow my clients like sports teams. I’m neither a fan or not a fan of anyone I work with.”

But I do think you’re a piece of shit.

His smug grin just grows wider as he stands there.

“Alistair, I know you objected to me working with Crown and Black.”

I mean, I did, but I sincerely doubt Gabriel would have mentioned that. He’s just guessing, knowing that I don’t like him.

“I’m afraid you’ve been misinformed, Ansel,” I say coldly. “Now, what did you want to discuss?”

He shakes his head. “Nothing, really. I just wanted us to…clear the air.”

“Consider it cleared,” I grunt, standing and turning to the door.

“You’ve done quite well for yourself, Alistair.”

I stop, turning to eye him coolly.

“I mean, I’m stunned by what you’ve accomplished with this firm. It’s truly impressive. For an orphan, I mean.”

A whining sound hums in my ears. My jaw tightens.

Ansel grins. “Normally it would take someone with real pedigree to open a firm with this sort of power and prestige. So, I applaud you, Alistair.”

Keep it up, motherfucker.

“As much as I’d love to pretend we’re still in college and have time to trade insults, Ansel,” I mutter, “I’m afraid I have work to do.”

He nods. “Of course. I was walking through your offices the other day, and I was amazed at how busy everyone seemed!” He grins that smug, condescending smile at me again. “It’s truly wonderful what someone like you has accomplished here.”

Someone like you.

My eye twitches.

“And the wildest thing,” he continues, “is who I saw the other day, when I was walking through your offices!”

“Oh?” I grunt.

He chuckles. “I had to do a triple-take, but fuck me if it wasn’t Eloise LeBlanc. Working here, at your firm!”

“Indeed,” I growl.

Ansel beams at me. “Wow…I guess that was one way to get her, huh?”

The whining in my ears grows louder. My hands close to fists as Ansel’s grin lasers in on me.

“Don’t tell me you didn’t pine after her like a puppy dog back at Knightsblood,” he chuckles. “Fucking hell, your face that night, when you thought it was her that me and the boys were gang-banging?” He starts to laugh louder. “Damn, I wish I’d had a camera.”

“I think this meeting is over,” I mutter , rage throbbing in my veins.

His brow arches. “Here’s the really interesting question though, Alistair. See, I’m sure you hired Eloise because she gets you all hard and squirmy. But…” He grins. “When I saw her the other day, she was talking to you. And the smile on her face?” His eyes laser in on me. “Usually, I’d say that’s how a woman looks at the man she’s fucking. But…Eloise is married, isn’t she?”

I meet his gaze unblinkingly. “She is.”

“And not to you, right?”

“Ansel, does any of this shit have a point?”

He laughs to himself and starts to stroll around the conference room table. “I like this new, all-business Alistair. You were such a prick at school when you were running The Reckless.”

“Funny, you’re still one.”

He grins. “Well, since you’re going to be working for me now, I’ll let you in on a little secret, Alistair,” he sneers. “Sadly, I never did get to fuck your little crush. But even though it wasn’t her that you saw that night…” He sighs heavily.

My vision starts to darken at the corners. My brain starts analyzing the way he’s standing, noticing he’s unguarded, as if I’m in one of the underground rings about to unleash hell.

He needs to stop talking and walk the fuck away.

“Here’s the thing, Alistair…”

He’s smiling at me, clearly taking my stoic silence and clenched fists as me shutting down when he should be taking it as the direct threat it is.

“While I was fucking her slut sister,” he grins, leering close. “I was imagining that pussy was Eloise’s.”

Something ticks over inside me, like a bomb about to explode.

“The same creamy French vanilla cunt, know what I mean?” he giggles. “And while I was fucking that slut from behind, you know what I was doing?”

I’m a hair’s breadth away from snapping as he leans close, grinning right in my face.

“I snuck a pair of Eloise’s panties out of the laundry earlier, and I fucking held that lace to my nose and inhaled like it was my last breath on Earth while I fucked her sis⁠—”

I fucking snap. It’s him, and the way he’s talking about Eloise, and the emotions still charging through my system from what happened with Rocco.

Ansel goes down on the first hit. But I don’t let him off that easily. I haul him back up, and I hit him again, and again, and again. I hit him so hard he flies out of my grip and smashes his face into the side of the conference table, shattering his nose. He’s screaming and blubbering when I grab him by the collar and yank him up to his knees as I hit him again.

He’s still screaming when four associates rush in and haul me off him.